EXMORMON
The guy responded by quoting the fourth Article of Faith verbatim: "We believe that the first principles and ordinances of the gospel are first faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, second repentance, third baptism by immersion for the remission of sins, and fourth laying on of hands for the gift of the Holy Ghost."
"That's exactly right," the teacher said. "Let's talk a little bit about baptism and about the laying on of hands and why these ordinances are necessary for our salvation."
I could tell that this was going to be a long lesson. I started staring at the back of Y's head. He really had beautiful thick wavy hair. His ear was perfect in size and shape as far as I could tell. Then I looked at his hands. His fingers were long, slender and graceful. He was absently doodling on the corner of his paper, but I couldn't tell precisely what he was drawing. It looked like it might be an airplane if it was anything at all. He was slouching a bit in his chair and resting his feet on the rack under the chair in front of him. Even his ankles and feet were slender and graceful in his worn sneakers. All in all I had to admit that he was quite a beautiful specimen.
In the background I could hear the teacher was still droning on about ordinances. "Now, who can tell me why we go to Sacrament Meeting every Sunday?" he asked.
That's an easy one, I thought to myself: because our parents make us go.
The teacher called on a girl in the second row. "Because our parents make us go," she said laughing. The whole room burst into laughter, and I even saw Y chuckle to himself. At that point I was really kicking myself. That was my line! I thought of it before she said it! If only I'd raised my hand, I could have impressed him with my wit! Darnit!
The teacher brought the class back to order and found someone to give the "real" answer, which was of course that when we partake of the sacrament we renew the covenants we made at baptism. But I couldn't help but think that my answer was also a correct answer. As I went back to gazing at Y, I started thinking about the Sunday services and how they were sufficiently unpleasant to require some temporal motivation to go along with the spiritual motivation. Or anyway some of us required extra motivation.
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